Zubeda Jalalzai

Academic Background

B.A. St.Lawrence University;
M.A. Binghamton University;
Ph.D. State University of New York (Buffalo)

I have been teaching at Rhode Island College since 2000 in the areas of early-19th-century American Literature, Postcolonial theory and Literature, and Literary Theory. I have published in the fields of Early American Literature, Transatlanticism, Native-American Literature, Postcolonial Theory, and Afghanistan. My current research involves Afghan travel narratives from the 18th century to the present day, which I am developing into a book manuscript titled, “Overland to Afghanistan: Travel Writing and the Afghan Romance.” In January 2015 a chapter from this work will appear in the collection, Asia and West, edited by Elisabetta Marino and Tanfer Emin Tunc (Macfarland & Co. Inc.) . I am also working on an edited collection of essays on the connection between 19th-Century American Literature and the Islamic World called “Washington Irving and Islam” forthcoming from AMS Press.

A fun project that I completed in 2011 was a photo-essay, Wayside Whaling: Moby Dick and the Whale Ornament in Contemporary New with photographer Jason Fiering that examines the visual elements in Herman Melville’s Moby Dick in relation to issues of representation in both the novel and contemporary New Bedford. The New Bedford Whaling Museum featured this essay as both a digital and physical art exhibit starting in November 1, 2012. Furthermore, the museum used the essay as the center piece for a Flickr group: Signifying the Whale Flickr: http://www.whalingmuseum.org/explore/collaborate/signifying-the-whale.

At RIC I also co-chair the Open Books-Open Minds, common book committee. Bringing the enthusiasm of reading to the larger campus as well as designing events and the spring student conference have been highlights of my teaching career. Check us out! www.ric.edu/obom

When I am not taking photos of whales in New Bedford, working on an OBOM program, or rushing to meet a deadline, you may find me hiking in the Adirondacks with my husband and three young children.